1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to an optical scanning device using an array of light emitting elements for converting an electrical image signal into a light image signal to be applied to a light-sensitive recording medium, and, in particular, to an optical writing device for optically writing an image on a recording medium in accordance with electrical image information supplied thereto. More specifically, the present invention relates to a scanning device including an array of fluorescent light emitting elements, which are activated selectively to emit fluorescent light in the form of a desired pattern, and fiber optics for guiding the thus emitted fluorescent light to an imaging surface.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Various types of optical writing devices are used in numerous recording machines such as printers. These optical writing devices used in printers are often times constructed with a laser, optical fiber tubes ( OFT ) and light emitting diodes ( LED ). An optical writing device using a laser beam as employed in laser printers requires the provision of high-speed moving parts such as a polygonal mirror, which necessarily makes the scanning optical system complicated in structure. OFT printers tend to be bulky due to the size of their scanning optical system, and, moreover, a fine gap between the end surface of each OFT and the imaging surface must be maintained accurately. Some printers use LED arrays or PLZT crystal optical shutter arrays as optical writing elements, but these semiconductor writing elements are rather expensive and limited in size and thus two or more of them must be electrically connected if the scanning line sector is relatively large.